1986 Donruss. A guide to framing your Picasso's.

Wade Boggs and Cal Ripken, Jr. were the starting left side of the American League All-Star team from 1986-1996.

About the Cards

 

As grading cards has gained wider acceptance and are no longer just a niche in the hobby for collectors with deep pockets the market has shown that most submit to BGS for modern cards and most submit to PSA for vintage. Will you see modern cards graded by PSA and vintage by BGS? Yes but the premium for the same grade can be vastly different.

Although the standards by which the card is being judged is virtually the same

BGS holds a distinct advantage by showing you a detailed report with sub grades.

BGS also holds the advantage in aesthetic and protection. The BGS slab includes an inner sleeve housed inside what amounts to a brick. It’s 100% tamper evident. One time I actually opened a PSA slab with no detection. Most likely that particular encapsulation was faulty but there is zero chance anyone can open a BGS slab without knowing.  The BGS slab is thicker and heavier. You feel you're Indiana Jones holding onto a precious artifact. A PSA holder feels like a fixture that needs to be attached to some Ikea desk.

A BGS Gem Mint label is written in GOLD. Its screams ‘this card is important’! The PSA label looks like it was done up on a Brother P-touch with a red marker by someone rushing to leave work. Not to mention it has the completely distracting George Orwellian bar code as well. 

With all this commotion why would anyone grade with PSA? Two words: Set Registry.

The PSA Set Registry is the single most important thing to happen to the hobby since Topps’ monopoly was broken up in 1981.

Not only was the idea an obvious and needed one in the hobby it was executed with perfection. You can’t say enough great things about the PSA Set Registry. It brought competition to the hobby and more importantly it brought major value to cards that are normally of none.

In the past 30 years, the hobby has seen a lot of awful sets and baseball has seen a lot of awful players but the PSA Set Registry has given players collectors a reason to seek out horrendous sets and set builders a reason to try and find that Gem Mint Alvaro Espinoza and players of the like.

In a perfect world, you would combine the BGS slab with the PSA Set Registry but the world is not perfect.